This Is Love
by Myrile
Summary: dedicated to a friend who didn't believe in love. you've got to trust it. harry is really deprested and sirius desiceds to give him some messages from those beyond the veil. sort of song fics on Rent songs.
1. Prologue: Without You

**AN:** This is for my friend who says love is pointless. I don't think she knows what love is. It is a bit preachy but yeah… I'm a preachy person. The little song bits under the title of the chapter are from Rent which is one of the greatest musicals ever.

**Disclaimer:** I don't own any of the characters, the events that I took from the books, or the Rent song bits. I'm not making money off of this.

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**Prologue: **

_Without you, the earth turns, the sun burns, but I die, without you._

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Harry stumbled through the cemetery that was his backyard, the names haunting him. A stone for his mother and father. A stone for Sirius. A stone for Dumbledore. A stone for Cedric. A gave for Lupin, dead not three weeks after Dumbledore, slaughtered like a sheep by the werewolves he had been spying on. But what pained him the most where the two fresh graves, two mounds of earth for two extraordinary girls, both murdered in the same massacre.

The Death Eaters attacked a group of girls in their dorms, mostly 11 and 12 year olds, but five 16 and 17 years olds had been with them. They all died and among them Hermione and Ginny.

Everything seamed so painfully normal, there wasn't anything out there screaming in protest and the carnage that rained down on the earth infuriated no loving G-d. All of it was for nothing, all the caring, all the loving, all the crying. In the end nothing came of it. What use was all this pain when there was no one to care? It was as though he was, slowly, silently dieing and no one cared about him.

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Sirius peered through the gauze shielding his eyes from the real world, from the world of life. Trying to look through was hard but something told he had to see what was happening. 'Harry' he whispered to the veil, 'I need to see Harry.' As if a divine hand had swept it away the veil was gone and he was floating down, towards the ground, towards a little house near a river.

He was near the house now, near enough to see the graves in the yard, near enough to see the young man kneeling, the blood streaking his cheeks where his nails had ripped them, near enough to see the way he struggled for air. Harry's nails where broken a dirty as he clawed at the ground, begging it to let him in. Tears filled his godfather's eyes and he rested a hand on his godson's shoulder.

"Who are you?" cried Harry spinning around wieldy, his face streaked with tears, blood, and dirt. His bloodshot, puffy eyes looked franticly for who ever had touched him. "Show yourself!"

"Poor boy," Sirius said softly, "we haven't left you. We are all around you. I know what pain you are feeling. We all suffer this pain. This is love. You don't understand what I am saying. I will show you. This is love."


	2. Lily: Your Eyes

**Disclaimer: **I don't own it and I don't make money from it

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**Lily Potter:**

_Can't get them out of my mind. And I find I can't hide from your eyes._

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Harry looked up and saw a figure approaching. She wasn't too tall and she carried herself with an air of sorrowful peace, an air of destiny. Her red hair shimmered as she walked towards him, her ghostly form gliding through the trees and over the pools of water. She face was wistful and she looked at him with the greatest green eyes he had ever seen. His eyes. And she spoke.

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_The last time I saw you, the last time I looked into your eyes I knew. I knew everything you would suffer in your life. And I knew I couldn't save you from it. The last time I looked into your eyes how sweet they looked to me. It felt like the first time I had ever held you. Yes, it felt like the first time to me. _

_I could hear my love fighting, screaming in the next room, dieing in the next room. I wanted to go to him so much. But I couldn't leave you. I knew I couldn't leave you ever. Not when I knew I could save you. Not when I knew I could never save him. How can I cry knowing I saved your life? This is love. _

_I could hear the footsteps approaching the door. I could here the echoes of my death to come. And I knew I could run. If I left you I could run. But how can I leave you, my child? How can I leave you to save myself? This is love. He spoke to me, my murderer. Told me that if I left you he would let me live. He would let me live but I would die, die with you. But while you live so do I and that is love. _

_Even after all these years I can still feel the way your little body pressed against me. And I knew I couldn't hide from my love for you. I died for you because that was the way it had to be. I died for you because this is love; this is the way love has to work. I held you until the end. And in the end I saw your eyes. _

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She continued to walk towards him, raising her hands and resting them on his head. "Mother." He whispered. "Mother." Lily Potter smiled and looked down on him, almost as if she was blessing him. She kept walking forward, passing into him and disappearing, leaving behind her a sense of peace, a trust and acceptance of destiny. _Every time you look in the mirror you see my eyes. In the end you'll know you can't hide. Not from my eyes. This is love. _


	3. James: One Song, Glory

**Disclaimer: **I don't own it and I don't make money from it.

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**James Potter**

_One song, before I go, glory, one song to leave behind_

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Harry was still. His mother's presence was everything he had ever hoped for from her. "Mom? Are you still here?" He couldn't see her any more; her last whisper had died away. "Are you here?" No answer. He walked over to her tombstone, reading what it really said for the first time. Lily Potter; died: October 31; She's Still Here While We Remember. And beneath that a picture of a lily.

_She's still here. Don't worry about her. She's happy now._ Harry turned around, know by the strange echoing sound the voice had that it was one of the dead. "Dad." He whispered. His father really did look like him. Very like him. _We're proud of you. Both of us. You're the one piece of us left behind in the world. You're our glory. _

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_I shoved you into her arms when I heard him coming. Shoved you into her arms and told her to run. That was the only way to save you, you know? All my life I had searched for one fight, one way to show everything I stand for. One test to show I was true. And now that the test was coming I was afraid. I saw everything I had to lose and I wanted to run back in time so that this wouldn't really be happening. _

_I wanted Lily live and you to live though. So I gave you to her and told her to run. And she ran for you. If you hadn't been born she would have stayed with me, trying to help me. I never heard him coming, Lord Voldemort. He was silent as the wind it's self. He came through the door and looked at me. Then he laughed. He asked me if I really thought I could beat him. I said I could. Then he laughed again. I fought him as best I could but he killed me. The last thing I heard was his whisper, so you think you can beat me? _

_I did beat him. I left you behind. I gave all I could give to you; I gave you part of me so I live on. When his curse hit me for the first time I knew true glory. The triumph of the winner who has lost everything to find one true song. It was destiny. _

_It's useless to run from destiny. Your mother taught me that. But that doesn't mean that you can't make sure that destiny bows to your rules first. And destiny bowed to my law. It left you behind to be my legacy. My one song. My glory. _

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James smiled at his son and raised his hands in blessing, placing them on Harry's head. Blessing him, just like Lily had. It seamed like forever while the father and son stared into each others eyes. The father's smile of hope changed to one of satisfaction. Harry's lips had just begun to curve up into a smile when James began to fade. "No." Harry whispered, trying to hold onto his father's transparent form. "Don't leave me."

_My work is done. My legacy is here. I must go now but know that you are the one promise I leave behind to the world. You are my glory. _


	4. Sirius: Past and Present

_How so you leave the past behind when it keeps finding ways to get to your heart?_

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He stared after the retreating ghost. Another shadowy presence was taking it's place. This one had a smile on it's face, a smile that looked back on a bitter life and found joy in simply having lived. Then the smile faded and his godfather began to speak.

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_I ran up to the house that night, too late. They were already dead. I'd never seen James sit still; even when he slept he was always tossing and turning. And yet there he was, so still. _

_In Azkaban I wanted to forget everything. I wanted to forget the war, Voldmorte, the whole world. G-d help me I even wanted to forget your parents, James and Lily, and Remus. I couldn't, somehow, some way; they all kept coming back to me. At first I thought it was just the dementors tormenting me. But I didn't want to leave the past behind. Some part of me still knew that if I forgot the pain I was in, if I forgot the people, then I would forget everything that really mattered in my life. When I saw Peter's picture in the paper I though I was living to kill him. What I really wanted was my life back, I wanted my friends back. I discovered that what I was really living for was not revenge, but justice. I knew that you would be lonely. I didn't really have any parents either. It wasn't right that the good people should suffer and the wicked should prosper. The ones we loved, even if they're dead, they're the ones that give us the strength to go on and keep fighting. We live through the past. _

_I remember the first time I ever saw you. You were such a tiny little red thing that kept screaming. Your dad just sat there stunned. He had no idea what to do with you. I think he was a little afraid of you. But when Lily held you, you calmed down. The way your father looked at her, like she was some kind of goddess, I can't forget it. I confess I didn't hold you. I'm not sure she would have trusted me to. _

_Before they went into hiding I saw you almost every day. One day your dad dressed you up like a little quidditch player and put you on this tiny broomstick… You couldn't have been more then 5 months. Lily screamed at him when she found out, even though he held on to you the entire time. And then they were gone and you were gone and there was nothing left. _

_Coming to that house that night was the hardest thing I ever did. I didn't want to go… to see… I pulled you out of there and gave you to Hagrid. Then I ran. I should have stayed, but I didn't. Your father could have told you I was never one for thinking. Maybe if I had been he could have. But look at you now. Just look at you. _

_I guess what I'm trying to say here is that we all have trouble. We all go through this life thinking we're so terribly alone, when really everyone around us is feeling the exact same way. So if we all are alone then aren't we really together? That doesn't make much sense, does it? Well look at it this way; the dead have the dead to look after them. You go and worry about the living. Don't be too proud to ask for help. Now I want you to get up, walk out of this graveyard, and get on with your life. Good luck. _


End file.
